Again, I love how the folks at ESPN.com thinks. It was very stealthily done, but ESPN recently updated their site's main Navigation. Before the recent makeover, the site sported (no pun inteded) a very subtle original look and feel that tried its best to cram all sports and links into a 2 tray style menu. The subtle look did it's job to make it not seem overwhelming, but almost too well. The transparency style of the nav blended all too well with the background, therefore rendering it lost in the visuals. Great for the content and banner ads but terrible for users trying to find what they need.

Recently, however, they changed their navigation to a more simple jet black and white style. Bringing much needed focus back to the menu area. Not only that, but the main inclusion for this modification was that they added a "add a sport" button which allows a logged in user to customize their own navigation. The benefits are two-fold: it allows for a cleaner look (without fading out the nav elements) and it allows users to choose whatever links he or she cares about most. By doing this, ESPN demonstrates that they understand how sports fans think and creates a brilliant solution for how their more power users navigate their site. Logged out fans still get the most popular sports on the top rail and all others tucked into the second or sub navs. I also like how this adds a lot more value to a logged in user.

Old Nav Style

New Nav Style (Logged In)

Ahhhh much better.. wouldn't you agree?